Best understudy you've ever seen? — Page 3

I was just about to post the same thing! I saw Laura Shoop as Amalia and Alison Cimmet as Ilona - they were incredible!!!

Another one I just thought of: Haven Burton as Elle Woods in Legally Blonde. She was leaps and bounds better than any of the other Elle's I saw in that production (Laura Bell Bundy, Becky Gulsvig, Bailey Hanks, and Kate Rockwell). She was the only actress who seemed to understand that Elle wasn't an idiot, and didn't play it that way.

Ive been an active theater goer since the late 70"s when I was a young boy. Ive seen many impressive understudies in my day. I had the pleasure of experiencing the original Dreamgirls more than once. Both times Sheryl Lee Ralph was out. I was able to see her understudy, Phylicia Rashad, both times. She was perfection. No wonder she went on to have a great great career.

Christopher Lippolt said: "Ive been an active theater goer since the late 70"s when I was a young boy. Ive seen many impressive understudies in my day. I had the pleasure of experiencing the original Dreamgirls more than once. Both times Sheryl Lee Ralph was out. I was able to see her understudy, Phylicia Rashad, both times. She was perfection. No wonder she went on to have a great great career."

I think I remember reading that when Sheryl Lee Ralph was leaving DREAMGIRLS, Phylicia Rashad was disappointed that she wasn't moved up to the role of Deena permanently so she left the show. Good move in the long run.

But truly none of them has even come close to being as transcendent and incredible as Jay Armstrong Johnson as Claude in the Hair revival. Why he isn't a huge Broadway star at this point will always be a mystery to me. He's the real deal."

THIS. I was there for his first full show and it was unreal."

I WAS THERE, TOO! He is amazing!!!

I saw Jenna Leigh Green go on as Elphaba in Toronto just after opening the First National Tour of "Wicked", and she was incredible! Towards the end she slid a little "Libby" (from Sabrina) into her character.

Stephanie Torns as Jenna in Waitress

Tee Boyich as Janis in Mean Girls

Darlesia Cearcy as Erzulie (Before she took over) in Once on This Island

Christian Dante White as Cornelius Hackl in Hello, Dolly!

Michael Lee Brown as Evan in Dear Evan Hansen

Mia Gentile as Lauren in Kinky Boots

Sydnee Winters as Eliza Hamilton in Hamilton

I want to add Christian Dante White as Cornelius Hackl to my list.

Edred Utomi as Alexander Hamilton in the Hamilton tour. He's definitely my favorite Hamilton out of the 4 I've seen.

Ryan Vasquez- Aaron Burr

Andrew Chappelle- Lafayette/Jefferson

Sydney James Harcourt- Aaron Burr

Stephanie Torns- Jenna and Dawn

Alysha Deslorieux- Angelica Schuyler

Elizabeth Judd- Eliza Hamilton

Olivia Puckett- Alana Beck and Zoe Murphy

Telly Leung- Angel Dumott Schunard

EDIT: JUST SAW GREGORY TRECO AS BURR AT THE FAN PERFORMANCE ON WEDNESDAY AND OOOOOOO MAHHHHHH GOSSHHHHHH!!! HE IS AMAZING!!!!!!!

Updated On: 11/4/18 at 09:49 PM

I've seen Ryan Vaquez as both Burr and Hamilton and both were phenomenal.

I loved seeing Jenn Collela as Elizabeth in If/Then.

But my #1 understudy performance has to be Miss Loren Lott as Ti Moune because I'd been a fan of her work since American Idol and had no idea she was even going on when I saw the show and it was such a special surprise.

Lauren Zarkin was phenomenal as Natasha I agree.

This technically isn't an understudy but during the Hedwig Revival tour, Lena Hall did one performance a week as Hedwig and it was unbelievable.

I was lucky enough to see Ben Ross go on for Evan Hansen a few weeks ago and all I can say is that the tour is in very good hands.

Judy Kaye in On the Twentieth Century. I was a huge Madeline Kahn fan, but she was not happy in the show and didn't seem to care who knew it. (I know others here saw Kahn when she was really "on", but I did not. The story didn't even make sense with Kahn sleepwalking through her part. To be fair, there was a video of John Cullum on line a few years ago talking about how he felt Kahn had been unfairly treated by the production, so there's another side to this story. I only know what I saw for myself.)

From Kaye's enthusiastic performance, I learned that it isn't enough to be supremely talented (as Miss Kahn was by all accounts), you have to act like you want to be there. The entire mock-opera style of the libretto was obscured until Kaye bounced out and played it to the hilt, I went back several times and now have seen Kaye in numerous other roles; she has never disappointed me.